dorkus malorkus π§ββοΈπͺ
Alistair DavidsonThe annoying nerds who said you should install Linux, use decentralised social media, use Signal secure messenger were right.
Control of our own computing is a prerequisite for freedom.
The internet *is* real life.
RRB@moh_kohn My prediction for 2025:
https://www.newsweek.com/russians-keep-mysteriously-falling-windows-deaths-1738954
Erik Ellestad
Beggar Midas@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn
1. If I were to plan something, it would not be in an open forum.
2. If I were to plan something, I would wait until a few tech oligarchs took a long walk out of a short window.
3. I would wait and see how the red state people enjoy paying tariffs when they buy stuff at Walmart.
I would also wonder if anyone suggesting organizing a "fight" might be an agent provocateur.
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn Not all action need be covert, for one. For two any potential for real anonymity disappeared over a decade ago. Three if Darth Gilligan carries through his threat to gut out the FBI there's no expertise to run the pro gear your worried about. Four, Those tech ogilarchs didn't look that joyous today. Bezos looked like he wanted to cry. Zuck look scared. Musk just looked distant. None of them were whooping it up.
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn largely research. Security and DDoS classes use my own texts.
Supply chains, DLT, helping get around censorship.
Dislike dictators. USSR, Campoare, Jammeh, and recent idiots.
Kinda too old to worry that much. Not really an attractive target
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn We're absolutely on the same fucking page about dictators. I've seen the fallout firsthand of what such men do in central america & Sarejevo & dharfur. The aftermath in eastern europe when the Iron curtain fell. As Russia revisited it's tired quest for the myth of the benevolent dictator. I'm old, too. But I'm too mad to sit it out.
As per your specialty...I could actually use your advisory assistance, if you're availably game. Hit me up in DM?
As per your specialty...I could actually use your advisory assistance, if you're availably game. Hit me up in DM?
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn Observed USSR collapse and the Eastern European dictators. Worked/working with Africans countering their kleptocrats. Anne Appelbaum's latest book is good about explaining that it is all corruption underneath.
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn I saw the Iron curtain fall myself. All the dozens of soft revolutions that followed, that ONLY could have occurred peacefully after the collapse of a major power. I still remember vividly the day CeauΘescu & his wife were shot. It was the very best Xmas present. Ah, heady days. Seemed like anything was possible. The future was ours. Pity Langley didn't clean up after themselves post collapse, allowing their pet mad dogs to go feral. Everything changed after 9/11.
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn I'm unfamiar with Anne Applebaums work. I'll look her up. I'm not much of an academic. Got chased out of school during the satanicpanic. So i'm mostly self taught. I'd toss college textbooks in my duffel to fill dead time while I was in transit. Which was usually. lol. As per Africa, i'm impressed. I'd gotten the impression many had become rather hostile to outside meddling in recent years. Benevolent or otherwise. I know i've been told to mind my own biz a few times!
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn
With Africa, a colleague of mine advised me to mainly listen. They are tired of White people lecturing them. If you set up a dialog and respond to their interests, things work better.
It is all about the grift:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autocracy%2C_Inc.%3A_The_Dictators_Who_Want_to_Run_the_World
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn Can't say I blame 'em. Not even a little. Not sure going 100% is possible due to expertise gaps. Not really fair to lump all us in together, but that's just a minor gripe. I get where they're coming from so I have to respect it. Sometimes folks just gotta work stuff out for themselves. Some sure don't mind being lectured by Wagner asshats though. Wonder how much longer they'll endure meddling from Moscow or Beijing or Tehran.
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn Conversations I have had with African colleagues kind of start from the point of view (I am often in the "former" French colonies) that when the French "left" the governments that were put in place were at least somewhat tied to France. France still ran the economy.
The elections are not really fair and the same semi-autocrats keep stealing from the people. So, this form of "Democracy" is not really giving them a voice, or prosperity, or ..
So they have no love for the quasi-authoritarians the French put in place 30 years ago. How much worse can the putsch be? Why not give it a try.
Also, Russia has latent good will from the USSR supporting anti-colonialism which led to their "liberation."
The Chinese. They don't really like the Chinese. But, they see them as a positive example of how they can move from being poor to having a voice in world affairs.
USA record in Africa is not great, either.
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn Hrm. Interesting. There's still persisting good will towards Russia to this modern day? Man did those soviet PR folks know how to leave an impression. Appalling how many messes France ditched in our laps left us on the hook for across the world. I know we were on an anticolonial kick up until the cold war, but still. In your honest opinion was a soft transition even possible, or was it just doomed to be a hard break no matter what?
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn The French never left. The countries were all kept stable by French troops. Their currency was the Franc CFA tied to the French Franc, then EUR.
And, frankly, I can understand them not liking their colonizers. Whatever our understanding of Russia and China may be, they have never colonized Africa.
That buys them some goodwill.
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn Sorry, I didn't mean to be unclear. I meant all of the west African countries that left the French protectorate & economic zone last year. As far as I know the only non African presence is USA maintaining any military presence, though even that looks like it may fracture soon.
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn Thank you very much BTW for your time explaining some of this stuff. I rarely ever have opportunities to discuss this at a long view policy level. It's a about as rare as rooster teeth running across anyone who even knows a damned thing on the topic. African politics is...complicated. lol
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn And everyone has very limited interest in the continent. They just see it as a lot of poverty. When I started traveling there, I actually left feeling uncultured.
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn On a significant lighter note i'm a big fan of the technicals. I'd love to go do a robust photobook safari of all the technicals in their many varied glory around the world. Talk to the people who put 'em together & keep 'em going. Get each one's unique origin story. I was floored by the variety around Africa. Every one I asked about had a heck of a local story attached. Usually several. Not sure how ACCURATE. But hella great stories. Would make a great adventure & book
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn Or, TV series, or movie series.
Did you ever see "District 9"
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn Oh yes. I was deeply impressed with that film. Especially since Blumkaupt(sp?) used an actual formal aparteid zone to film most of it in. I'd heard there's finally supposed to be some sequel in the works...? Though i'm not typically a fan of misanthrope films. If I wanted to feel constantly guilty all the time about being a human I'd convert to Catholicism or be an ultraenviromentalist.
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn I liked the vibe. Particularly, the future Nigerian organized crime group seemed very "Afro-futurist" to me. Turns out, most Nigerians just feel insulted by the film.
@ellestad @rrb @moh_kohn according to some of my old peers still in the trade i've spoken with all the outfits are overbooked. Nobody available. Four month waiting list on all the actual competent outfits. Might still be some available in the fly by night dregs. Little more than mall cop temp agencies. If you feel like trusting your life to a half assed Blart getting paid 15 bucks an hour, TOPS.
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn How much does that cut into your tax breaks?
Or, they could go to their underground compounds they have invested in for when society collapses.
Self-fulfilling prophecy, much?
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn Not sure who you're directing that to. Only one with a doomsay duckout I know of is Peter Theil in NZ. Started it in 2014, completed it in 2017.
Lemme tell you something about bunkers though. They aren't that hard to crack once you get past all the earth & rock in the way. It never seerms to occur to anyone with no military background to insulate the doors. Stack firewood on a door long enough it turns that bunker into a pressure cooker.
Lemme tell you something about bunkers though. They aren't that hard to crack once you get past all the earth & rock in the way. It never seerms to occur to anyone with no military background to insulate the doors. Stack firewood on a door long enough it turns that bunker into a pressure cooker.
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn
You are right, they seem to be blinded by their own arrogance
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn lol. Thats most people anymore in the industrial world, once the money & influence are removed. How many people you know personally lost in la-la land? That have retreated into some fantasy construct of religion or political zealotry or fan club mania? It's the whole fucking 1st world mate, by and large. Minus a few notable exceptions dealing with the harsh daily reality of war. Lunatics rule the asylum now. Maybe it's the microplastics building up in our neural gaps.
@Beggarmidas @ellestad @moh_kohn Deal with lots of African activists.
They do seem more grounded. They have real issues.
@rrb @ellestad @moh_kohn That echoes my own assessment. This is a disease that presents the strongest symptoms in the first world. I've long speculated that humans require facing actual adversity to mature properly. It's fascinating to me that in places with no such struggle available people will end up creating it somehow. The most problematic individuals are typically the same ones that never really seemed to grow up. Not struggling for anything locks them in a perpetual adolescent state.
Auntie Mame
Mark Wieczorek@moh_kohn Zuck just can't be normal.
SpaceLifeFormI would add: Avoid clouds.
uexo@SpaceLifeForm @moh_kohn Funny that the posts praises Signal, hosted in the Amazon cloud, instead of XMPP, the internet standard which allows you to host your server in your own home. Signal is just another walled garden.
Network == Abstraction Layer@moh_kohn periodic reminder that newspaper publishing was a key component of Mussolini's rise to power
Ken M Sweeney@moh_kohn a missed opportunity.
@moh_kohn What a telling and ominous photo: Tech Billionaires before Cabinet
Kevin RussellIts not an inauguration: Its a wedding of the rapist Emperor, to the child bride America, and billionaires came like witches to watch the Emperor rape her.
Jugger1511
γͺγγ₯γΌππ΅πΈ@jugger1511 @kevinrns @moh_kohn Evil soldout pieces of shit (ie billinaire) is enough to me without jumbling a very hard profession by the most exploited (sex worker) into it.
@moh_kohn Yeah, and internet dependance has really killed folks ability to read body language. One of my archaic in this digital age specialties.
Someone far more important than my nobody ass should be asking better questions.
Why does Jeff Bezos look sad behind a forced half smile he's wearing like a mask?
Why does Zuckerberg look scared & worried?
We can make some sound guesses why Elon looks so distant & thoughtful.
These men should be whooping it up. All the true believers are.
Someone far more important than my nobody ass should be asking better questions.
Why does Jeff Bezos look sad behind a forced half smile he's wearing like a mask?
Why does Zuckerberg look scared & worried?
We can make some sound guesses why Elon looks so distant & thoughtful.
These men should be whooping it up. All the true believers are.
Near the end of the movie, after the apparently successful heist, the "crew" that was assembled for the heist, watch the rest of the crew for the betrayal.
Hitler, after a smaller heist in Germany, murdered whole sections of the Nazi Party, Hitler's first mass murders.
Maybe they read history?
@kevinrns @moh_kohn I've been working like hell to head this thing off for seven years. Fuck all good it did. Nobody believed it was possible. They still don't believe that what comes next is gonna happen. I've got the history. Thanks. It's guided & advised my actions. The problem I have is overcoming peoples resistance to doing fuckall about the present state of events. Got any beneficial wisdom to offer on that count?
Save the at risk.
@kevinrns @moh_kohn Working on it. They're not exactly recognizing the risk though. They're still in denial. The usual 'can't happen here' or 'can't happen to me' refrain that unites victims across the ages. I've been trying to prep 'em for two months now. Not making great progress, truth be told. Many have been downright nasty & hit the ignore key after some choice words. Problem is people are willing to be scared, but not proactive.